The blog contains articles by the author which appear in various newspapers in Kashmir and are also available on the website: www.kashmirfirst.com

Wednesday, January 10, 2018

The Only Meeting Ground!

(The
only meeting ground between the two Asian countries of India and Pakistan is
the extreme poverty of the masses on the two sides of the divide!)

It has been
reported that the National Security Advisors of India and Pakistan met in
Thailand on December 27, secretly! The meeting is reported to have been useful and it is claimed
that it might help in restarting some sort of engagement at the diplomatic
level as well. Well, there
is always a continuous refrain from every quarter that leaders of India and
Pakistan should have a dialogue and sort out all the differences to usher in
peace and prosperity in the sub-continent. Both the countries are poor and the
bulk of the population needs means for improvement in their living standards
rather than to fight each other. Unfortunately, there appears to be nothing
common between these two Asian countries except extreme poverty of the majority
of the people living there! Normally, they should have been helping each other
to usher in prosperity to the teeming millions living below the poverty line
but on the contrary they are looking for newer avenues to get at each other’s
throats!

In contrast to
the abject poverty of the majority of their population, the rulers on both the
sides have something else in common, their wealth! They have amassed wealth not
only in their own countries but in foreign banks and even invested it in some
“safe havens” abroad even though these havens are no longer safe as revealed by
Panama and Paradise papers! While on the other side the few “dirty rich”
families have gobbled up everything, on this side the “Corporates” have
digested entire resources leaving the poor to fend for themselves. The bulk of
the population on both sides is living in what is come to be known as the
“below the poverty line”. In other words by global standards especially in the
western countries, they are not even “poor” but something much worse than that!

But a question
arises, why are these countries so poor in spite of so many resources? Well,
the answer is the new type of colonialism faced by them. It is the economic
colonialism or what is known as the neo-colonialism. For 200 years, the British
robbed the sub-continent of all its resources to develop their own country.
With the masses awakening all over the world, all the colonial powers had to
end their physical possession of these under-developed countries but they came
in with this new type of colonialism. They applied a dual strategy. On one side
they ensured that the economies of these countries remained tied to their
multi-national corporations and on the other, they created “disputes” to make
these poor people fight each other. For this fighting they sold these countries
weapons, the sale of which amounting to billions of dollars, ensured jobs for
their own people back home!

The largest
portions of the budgets of these two countries go in for purchasing armaments
from western countries especially USA. India is the largest importer of
armaments in the world while USA is the largest manufacturer and exporter! For
the sale of their weapons these neo-colonialists create disputes and bickering
all over the world. The partition of the sub-continent was their subtle and
clandestine creation. After their departure they ensured that these two countries
were always at logger heads! Well, Americans are basically violent people. They
exterminated Red Indians to completely take over the country even though they
were outside settlers. In fact, that country was born out of the blood of Red
Indians and developed through the black slaves imported by them from Africa. The
violence of their birth often manifests itself in shootings and killings in
many parts of USA off and on!

To keep hold on
the energy resources of the Middle East (the oil) they put the dagger of Israel
in the heart of the Arabs! All the Middle Eastern wars have been fought for
control over cheap oil while they kept their own oil fields reserved for future
use! Iraq, Libya and other countries were virtually destroyed for oil. The
Arabs who once almost controlled the whole Europe, Middle East and parts of
Asia have been reduced to total vassals finally dependent on their good will!

The only country
they are scared of is China. Its rise is a nightmare for the Americans as is
evident from the Steven Bannon’s book about Trump presidency where he has
compared China to Nazi Germany. It has virtually beaten them in economic
progress and welfare of their own people. Their aim is now to surround it and
halt their progress especially the economic progress. Unfortunately, India has
fallen in their trap due its present leadership’s obsession with religious
fanaticism. The Americans have now turned their heat on Pakistan which has
developed very close relations with China. They want to use Afghanistan as a
foothold to control China and Central Asia but the way things are going it may
prove their graveyard!

If these three
Asian countries, China, India and Pakistan join together, they will rule economically
the entire world! The basic requirement for these two Asian neighbours, India
and Pakistan, is to realise that the only meeting ground between them is the
abject poverty of their masses. If they do so, the poverty of their teeming
millions will totally disappear! They will become the future leaders of the
entire world! Let us hope and pray that they do so sooner than later for the
welfare of us all!